


The End of the Line

by NocturnalRites, srmiller



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alien Invasion, Angst, Apocalypse, Apocalypse Prevented, Challenge Response, Community: apocalyptothon, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-01
Updated: 2014-09-01
Packaged: 2018-02-15 18:35:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2239146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NocturnalRites/pseuds/NocturnalRites, https://archiveofourown.org/users/srmiller/pseuds/srmiller
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For the prompt:  Maybe a not-so-happy ending to the Avengers movie - take this as you will. Otherwise, go wild!</p><p>In which one critical change causes a domino effect, irony abounds and while the job gets done, it's not pretty or happy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The End of the Line

**Author's Note:**

  * For [possiblyveryodd](https://archiveofourown.org/users/possiblyveryodd/gifts).



> We do not own these characters or properties nor do we profit from this work. All rights and any and all quotes are owned or attributed to Marvel.

"Snakes and dragons," says Thor. "It is fitting, at least."

Steve transfers a portion of his attention from Tony Stark’s guided missile flight to the bloodied, battered Asgardian at his side. Maybe that last Chitauri blast had rung Thor's bell harder than Steve had thought. "What?" 

"Snakes and dragons," Thor says again. He nods to the last leviathan, which is undulating down a cross street a block away from them. "They are what Midgard uses as symbols of Ragnarök. Your skalds sang that brothers would fight and kill each other, and I would face the serpent Jörmungandr and fall nine steps after its defeat. It is not all the same as they described, but it is close enough.” He shakes his head, his voice harsh with fatigue and regret. "I wanted only to protect this realm, and instead, I am one of the instruments of its ending."

"Fat lady's not singing yet," Steve says, although he thinks if Kate Smith were around, she'd probably be belting out one hell of a chorus of 'God Bless America'. “Stark’s still got the nuke.”

Above them, Tony and the nuke vanish into the open portal.

~*~  
The missile darts from Tony’s hands, a technological shark swimming through the cold and the dark towards the mothership. Breathing shallowly, Tony strains to see into the void and waits for the explosion.

And waits.

And waits.

And waits.

The sparks of fire propelling the weapon sputter and go dark. Silently, the weapon glides past its target, inertia carrying it on to some unknown corner of space.

"Son of a bitch," Tony wheezes in disbelief. "A _misfire_?"

If Stark Industries had supplied the nuke, Tony would guarantee the damned thing would have blown. He’d gotten out of armaments because he’d thought he had more to offer the world than just making things that blew up. Figures that something that actually _blew up_ when it was supposed to would be what the world needed from him instead.

Talk about performance issues.

He'd laugh at the irony if he had the air left to do it.

Armored leviathans bump by him, tossing him like a man-sized action figure away from the portal and into the frozen darkness beyond it.

At least he’d proved Cap wrong, Tony thinks. Turns out he is the kind of idiot to make the sacrifice play after all. Too bad he’ll never get the chance to gloat over having the last word.

The last puff of air ghosts through his suit as the arc reactor goes dark.

~*~

“Come _on_ , Stark,” Natasha murmurs into the comm.

Steve stares at the rip in the sky. The hole’s black and featureless. No flash of an explosion, no sign of Stark’s return, but his angle’s not the best.

“Do you see anything, Natasha?”

He hears her swallow, but her voice is steady. “No. It doesn’t look as if the nuke exploded. We’ve got another leviathan headed out, though, if we don’t close up.”

Steve steels himself for the inevitable. It's not the first time he's lost a soldier. It’s not even the first time he’s had to abandon the body of a friend. This time's got an added cruel twist, though; Steve's the one who has to give the order to abandon Howard's son, when Howard was the one person who'd never stopped searching for Steve. A poor way to repay that kind of friendship. Even if it's the tactically sound thing to do, it doesn't make the decision any easier or make it weigh less on his soul. 

But it's got to be done, and he's the one who has to make the call. Erskine's request of him aside, Steve's learned there are times when the soldier has to be ascendant over the good man. 

"Close it," he orders. 

For a moment, he thinks this, too, will fail, but the column of energy blinks out of existence. The tear in the sky slowly heals in time to prevent the new leviathan from breaking through. Not even a scar of cloud remains to show what lies behind the unmarred blue facade. 

The Chitauri circling Steve and Thor advance once more. Thor smashes Mjölnir into another car and steamrollers some of them, while Steve bashes two away with his shield and punches another over the edge of the overpass. A moment of quiet follows, though Steve can hear the rapid zing of aircraft fire down the street, near where he’d last seen the Hulk.

“Barton!” he calls. “What’s the scene?”

“Lost my perch, Cap, and I’m outta arrows. Last I saw, they have the Hulk pinned down over on 8th Street. Got one leviathan left, comin’ in north of you. Army’s over off 39th.”

“How’re they doing?”

“Not good. They can take ‘em, but there’s gonna be a lot of casualties if we don't thin this herd. Not sure what they’re gonna do about that leviathan. Better get it down in a hurry, though. It was heading for the Army convoy, last I saw.”

One hell of a time for them to lose their only air support, Steve thinks. Guilt stabs him for viewing Stark's loss in that light. “Natasha, can you see the Hulk? Any chance he can break free?”

“It’s probably best if he doesn’t. At least he’s got most of the aerial attacks focused on him. If they’re attacking him, they’re not attacking the convoys, too.”

Steve and Thor exchange glances. The Asgardian grins.

“I will challenge Jörmungandr,” he says. “A legendary final battle!”

Steve nods acknowledgement, understanding now what Thor had meant by bringing up the poem in the first place. Thor had enough reserves left for the leviathan, but not the Chitauri who would come after it. He forces an answering grin.

"Admit it, you just want to hog the bragging rights for killing a dragon."

Thor laughs. "The slaying of a dragon is a better tale of valor than a tale of battling these petty green warriors." 

"Yeah, you'll be able to drink for years on that one," Steve says, hoping against hope that might really be the case. Hell, he'll buy the first round if they make it out of here. He'd like that. It would be a little like drinking with the Commandos again.

“Where do you want us, Cap?” asks Barton.

Steve considers, mentally flipping through strategies. They’ve cut off reinforcements, at least. At the end of the street, what looks like two or three companies of Chitauri foot soldiers are regrouping. There’s the leviathan and the remaining aerial support. Loki’s still out there somewhere. 

“Listen up. We’ve got the portal closed. Best thing we can do is reduce the numbers and give the Army what they need to fight back. Natasha, you’ve got the aerial view. Keep an eye on troop strength and numbers. Get in touch with Fury and give him that information so he can coordinate with the Army. Tell them to start evacuating civilians as soon as possible. Destroy the machine. Get the tesseract back to S.H.I.E.L.D. and get it out of Loki’s reach. Barton. Get to Natasha and help her. Got it?”

“Copy that,” says Natasha, followed by Barton’s, “Roger that, Cap.” 

Steve takes a deep breath before continuing. “Thor, Hulk and I’ll fight a rearguard, give the Army a chance to regroup. We’ll leave the flyers with Hulk. I’ve got the ground troops down here. Thor, you take the leviathan.”

“Captain, you can’t. That’s sui–“ Hawkeye begins, but Natasha overrides him.

“Understood.” Her voice is calm and cool. If it’s a little rough around the edges, they all choose to ignore it. “We’ve got our part covered, Cap.”

Behind them, the rattle and clank of the last leviathan echoes faintly off the buildings lining the street. Grinning broadly, Thor claps Steve on the shoulder. That it doesn’t make him stagger, even as tired as he is, tells Steve how drained the Asgardian must be.

“Nothing shall stand between us and Valhalla but the battle and the glory!” Thor booms. Taking a fresh grip on Mjölnir, he strides down the street towards the leviathan. 

The approach of the Chitauri forces Steve to turn away before he can see if the poem’s prediction is true or if he'll be able to buy Thor that drink after all. 

~*~

Shooty aliens hurting Hulk. Hulk mad. Banner wants shooty aliens to hurt Hulk. Make Hulk weak so Hulk will sleep. If Hulk sleep, Banner dies. Banner wants Hulk to die. 

Banner puny. Hulk knows. Is why Hulk is Hulk. But Hulk not puny like Banner. Hulk not want to die! Shooty aliens make Hulk madder. Mad Hulk is stronger Hulk! Hulk too strong for aliens! 

Hulk sees rock. Is other way to smash. Hulk takes rock and throws. Shooty alien goes boom and falls! Hulk roars!

Hammer Man walks to big worm. Hulk wants to smash big worm. Hammer Man not take Hulk’s worm! Hulk tries to go to worm. Too many shooty aliens. Hulk not able to move! Hulk have to smash more first. Make Hulk madder. Hulk wants worm, not shooty aliens. Worm is fun to smash.

Hammer Man blasts worm. Hammer Man not smash good like Hulk! Worm falls, crunch. 

No more worm. No more Hammer Man. Hulk disappointed. Hulk wanted to punch Hammer Man again. 

~*~

Natasha keeps up a steady patter of information to Steve and to S.H.I.E.L.D, her voice almost inflectionless in its calm. Steve doesn’t have enough breath to answer, but he’s glad of the company, especially after the crackle and buzz when Thor’s communicator goes offline. 

He doesn’t know how many Chitauri foot soldiers he’s taken down. Enough to have one hell of an honor guard, anyway. Enough to where he almost thinks he’ll fight his way free. The Army should be able to manage what’s left, and that’s the important thing. 

Clint might think his actions are suicidal, but Steve knows they’re not. He’s chosen to do what he was made for, is all. Saving lives. Taking the risks. Being the front line. Protecting those who can’t fight back.

What a good man would do. What Erskine had charged him to do with those final two taps on his chest.

But in the end, he’s too tired. A half second too slow. A blast of blue energy blazes past the edge of his shield, and this time, there’s no Thor to cover him. He’s knocked down for a critical minute, breathless with fire and pain.

But he's not giving up. He's the kid from Brooklyn who doesn't know when to quit, after all.

He makes it back up on one knee before the second blast hits.

Like anything else, dying gets easier with practice. This time, he’s got his regrets out of the way. Nothing to lose, no one who'll have to mourn him. He's not alone, either.

He’s glad now he didn’t see Peggy. He wouldn’t have wanted to hurt her again.

~*~

Hulk sees Shield Man. Shield Man talked to Hulk. Shield Man not afraid of Hulk. Hulk likes this. Shield Man tells Hulk to smash. Hulk likes this more!

Shield Man smash like Hulk but not as good. Hulk smash best! Hulk gets more rocks. Hulk smashes more shooty aliens! Hulk smash more, can go to Shield Man. Hulk will show Shield Man how to smash! Shield Man has lots and lots to smash!

Shooty aliens are boom gone. Hulk can go to Shield Man now. But Hulk not see Shield Man any more. Banner is sad. Banner thinks Shield Man is lucky. Banner thinks Shield Man at peace, not sad out-of-place. Banner jealous of Shield Man, too. Banner only one who wants to die but can’t. Banner thinks this is funny, but not ha-ha.

Banner stupid.

~*~

The breeze touches Natasha’s cheeks, cool in streaks.

She’d told the truth to Loki. She didn’t weep for the fall of regimes. 

But she could, she did, have enough of herself left to shed two tears for friends. If the reason had been different, she would have been glad to know she was still capable of that much. As it was, she’d rather not know.

How ironic, she thinks, watching the Chitauri mill around the still blue form and battered shield lying in the middle of the street. Of all of them, she was the one with the ledger which dripped blood. She was the one who deserved to be killed. Not Thor. Definitely not Cap.

Instead, she was the one who'd been ordered to live, and live, she would. Making their sacrifices count was more important than her own redemption.

So was vengeance.

Selvig had kept himself together long enough to destroy the machine’s programming. Since Thor fell, he’s been folded at her feet, weeping. Natasha wishes she had that luxury. 

Suddenly, he lets out a strangled sound of horror. “The scepter,” he gets out. “It just vanished.”

Natasha whirls. She’d put the artifact down the moment she could, not deeming it safe to be in contact with it any longer than absolutely necessary. 

“ _Bozhe moi_ ,” she breathes, then keys on her comm. “Clint, where are you?”

“I’m a street away,” comes the laconic answer. “Had some Chitauri who wanted me to stop and chat.”

“Hurry up. I think Loki’s got the scepter.”

“Ah, no,” he groans, then swears. “Comin’ right on up.”

Steadily, Natasha reloads her Glocks, then checks them over with the mechanical ease of long practice. 

If Loki is close enough to steal his scepter, he’s close enough to shoot. If she’s lucky, maybe her vengeance will come a little quicker than she’d thought.

~*~

So Clint’s lying, a little. Wouldn’t be the first time.

He _is_ beating up Chitauri on his way to Stark Tower, but he’s also looking for some arrows. One arrow’ll do. One arrow to put in that bastard Loki’s eye socket, that’s all he needs.

He’s fixated on the need for an arrow with an intensity he recognizes as not being quite ...sane. Sane had started teetering on the razor’s edge of unbalanced with Cap’s last muted groan over the comm link and the wet thunks of blades stabbing into unresponsive flesh.

Cap. Thor. Stark. The S.H.I.E.L.D. agents back on the helicarrier. That poor bastard back in Germany. Dead. 

No matter what Natasha said, the fact was, he’d assembled people to help Selvig. Had broken in to get the one key item to make the portal work. Had led the strike team to _free_ that rat bastard Loki. He’d been a puppet, he'd been trapped and fighting to get out of his own mind, but he’d _done_ it. Whether he’d been willing or not, his teammates are still dead because of his actions.

Putting an arrow in Loki won’t bring any of them back, he knows, but it’ll stop the bastard. It’ll make sure he can never scoop out Clint’s or anyone else’s brain again. That’s enough for Clint.

Finally, he sees one arrow stuck in a crashed Chitauri vehicle right at the foot of Stark Tower. He works it free, checks the shaft, then shoves it in his quiver.  


Although the electricity's out in most of Midtown, thanks to the arc reactor, the elevators inside are still working. Clint eases out of the elevator on the top level, bow in hand. The first thing he notices, apart from a glittering shower of glass over the floor, is a pair of vaguely humanoid-sized dents in the gray slate tiles. He blinks at the thought of the sheer force it had to have taken to have create them, then blinks again when he thinks of what kind of humanoid could survive that kind of beating.

“How delightful. The dog crawls back on its belly to its master.”

Loki’s voice comes from behind him, low, rich, obscenely smug. Without pausing for thought, Clint snatches his lone arrow from his quiver, whirls, and shoots in one blinding movement–-

\--through Loki’s flickering image and into a wooden railing beyond it.

Before he’s had time to register the miss, Loki’s in front of him, scepter point needling into Clint’s chest. And as before, Clint can feel his will draining, bleeding away from him. When he’s immobilized, Loki strolls over and yanks the shaft from the railing.

He’d scream, except he’s not going to give Loki the satisfaction. 

His one consolation is that Loki looks like he’s had the shit kicked out of him. The combination of Thor beating him, Clint’s explosion and the Hulk’s – it had to be the Hulk’s – slamming, the Asgardian is breathing heavily, holding a hand to his ribs as if they might be broken. Another bomb, maybe with a 70 story fall, might even finish him.

“You shouldn’t blame yourself.” Loki shakes his head, amused. “My dear, departed brother always fell for that trick, too.”

The possession is occurring much more slowly this time than it had the first. Cold, like ice leeching life from his body, cell by cell. Clint doesn’t think it’s because Loki can’t do it faster. It’s because Loki wants it that way. Slow. Maximum suffering.

He wonders if it’s like how Cap had felt when he was freezing, after his plane crashed. He’ll never know, now. 

Loki takes hold of his shoulders and propels him to the edge of the room, next to the broken window and the sheer drop beneath it. Above them, on the far tower, he can see Natasha standing by the machine, her Glocks in her hands, ruffled hair ablaze in the sun.

“Take a good look,” Loki urges. “I’ve made a little promise to her about you, and I want you to fulfill it. Kill her slowly. Intimately. Kill her in all the ways she fears most. You know those, don't you?”

Clint does. He also knows it's the line he's not going to cross, whatever it takes.

Setting his jaw, he pushes back as hard as he can, to no avail. It’s like trying to push against dry ice vapor, searing cold and nothing to grasp. Even knowing what’s happening this time, he’s got nothing he can use to counter. He’s an ex-circus kid turned assassin, and all the magic he knows is carnie tricks to fool the rubes. All the will he can muster is only delaying the inevitable.

 _Don’t blame yourself. This is monsters and magic and nothing we were ever trained for_ , Natasha had said. 

Doesn't make it any better.

Loki hands him the lone arrow shaft. He sees his hand reach out to take it. There’s the calluses from his bowstring on his fingers, the twisted horseshoe of a scar he got in Budapest beside his thumb, yet it feels like a stranger’s hand grafted onto his arm. 

“Your arrow needs a new point,” says Loki. “Take care of that, won’t you?”

A tiny thread of volition returns and with it, a even smaller pulse of hope. He's not allowed much freedom, only enough that along with muscle memory, it serves to do what Loki orders. But it's enough. With the ease of long practice, Clint keeps his face expressionless as he makes his selection and brings the arrow out again. The curve of his palm hides a ring of blinking red dots at the base of the arrowhead. 

Maybe he wasn’t trained for monsters and magic, but Loki wasn’t trained to be a sniper or a spy, either.

Carnie tricks. Sleight of hand. Who would have thought they could trump real magic?

“Don’t worry,” Loki soothes, glee rippling under the smooth, dark surface of his voice. “You’re following your original orders, after all. She was always meant to die at your hand. Consider this a delay in the inevitable. The price for your original insubordination.”

The ice is at his neck, in his brain. His vision is like the portal closing, black rimmed in bright blue, Natasha in its center.

“Don’t shoot to kill. I want her death to take a while,” Loki purrs in his ear. “She’s made me very angry, I’m afraid, and you’ll have to make her pay for doing that. But I’ll let you come out once you’re done, to appreciate your good work...and scream.”

The blinking red lights count down to detonation. 

_Three_. 

"Don't count on it," Clint told him.

 _Two_. 

Smiling, he opens his hand to reveal the explosive arrowhead to Loki. 

_One_.

“ _Avenge_ , dickhead,” he says. 

Loki’s reaction, if any, is seared into burning white silence.

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. The poem Thor references is the Poetic Edda. The snakes and dragons have been found in 10th and 11th century churches as a Ragnarök reference.  
> 2\. Kate Smith was a very well known contralto in the WWII era (and later), known both for her rendition of ‘God Bless America’ and for her Rubenesque figure.  
> 3\. Hulk’s passage is inspired by (and stylistically modeled after, even if the content’s different) the superb Hulk-view story ‘Me Smash Good’ on Fanfiction.net by Sookie Starchild.  
> 4\. (NR) Blame Trocadero's 'When We Were Soldiers'.


End file.
